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Author: Shreve, Joseph

Biography:

SHREVE, Joseph (1787-1846: ancestry.com)

He was the eldest son of Lt. John Shreve (1762-1854), who had fought in the 2nd New Jersey Regiment during the Revolutionary War, and his wife Abigail Ridgeway (1765-1808). This military history notwithstanding, the family were Quakers. There is some confusion about where he was born: his birth certificate gives Providence, Fayette Co. PA but his gravestone gives Burlington NJ. The family did settle in Fayette, so perhaps he was born in NJ with the birth registered in PA. Joseph Shreve became a schoolmaster. His only publications, besides the poems that were written to mark the end of a school year (and probably his retirement from teaching), were an Introduction to the Speller's Guide (1822) and the Speller's Guide (1824) itself. He never married, and taught in various schools supported by the Society of Friends: his two spellers were published at Uniontown PA and Buffaloe VA. In 1809 he was sent to Salem OH for a year; he returned in 1822 and stayed for over a decade as a popular teacher. According to Hunt, he lived in Salem with his two unmarried sisters, but the (sketchy) family records do not mention them. Both he and his brother Thomas qualified as physicians under the mentorship of Dr. Stanton in Salem; after leaving Salem, he carried on a medical practice in Mount Union OH. He died in Alliance Junction OH--as did his father, a few years later--and is buried there. (ancestry.com 18 Sept. 2020; George Dillwyn Hunt, History of Salem and the Immediate Vicinity [1898]; Harold B. Barth, History of Columbiana County, Ohio [1926])

 

Books written (1):